Biographies & Memoirs - Books

Life of John Sterling

Biographies & Memoirs

The Life of John Sterling is most often read as a work of Carlyle, rather than from an interest in the life of Sterling, and this was probably the case, even when the work was published in 1851. However, the biography portrays Sterling as someone who evidently regarded himself as equal to Carlyle, and perhaps this is one of the things that Carlyle liked about him. He was a great sounding board for Carlyle’s work, and a most entertaining and revealing passage is one in which Carlyle quotes Sterling’s analysis of his brilliant Sartor Resartus, in which he mocks Carlyle for making up words.

Leçons d'un siècle de vie

Biographies & Memoirs

"Qu'il soit entendu que je ne donne de leçons à personne. J'essaie de tirer les leçons d’une expérience séculaire et séculière de vie, et je souhaite qu'elles soient utiles à chacun, non seulement pour s'interroger sur sa propre vie, mais aussi pour trouver sa propre Voie." E.M. À 100 ans, Edgar Morin demeure préoccupé par les tourments de notre temps. Ce penseur humaniste a été témoin et acteur des errances et espoirs, crises et dérèglements de son siècle. Il nous transmet dans ce livre les enseignements tirés de son expérience centenaire de la complexité humaine. Leçons d'un siècle de vie est une invitation à la lucidité et à la vigilance.

Incidents In the Life of a Slave Girl

Biographies & Memoirs

Incidents in the Life of a Slave GirlAn Apple Books Classic edition.Harriet Jacobs was born into slavery on a North Carolina estate, where she remained for the first six years of her life. Harriet and her mother served the mistress of the house, who taught Harriet to read and write and promised the enslaved girl freedom. That promise was broken when Harriet was sold into worse circumstances. She went on to have two children with a white man in the hopes of staving off the attentions of her cruel master, but when her plan backfired, Harriet decided to save her children by risking her own life—and running.Published in 1861, Jacobs’ autobiography captured what life was like for a fugitive: always afraid, always on the move…for years. Hers is one of the first such accounts written by a woman, offering an intimate perspective on the dehumanizing horrors inflicted upon enslaved women. Jacobs’ autobiography helped mobilize many people to the growing abolitionist movement, and the book shows why Jacobs is considered not only an important abolitionist but also a feminist. Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl deepens our understanding of slavery’s legacy.

The Light We Carry

Biographies & Memoirs

#1 NEW YORK TIMES AND USA TODAY BESTSELLER • ONE OF TIME’S 100 MUST-READ BOOKS OF 2022 • In an inspiring follow-up to her critically acclaimed, #1 bestselling memoir Becoming, former First Lady Michelle Obama shares practical wisdom and powerful strategies for staying hopeful and balanced in today’s highly uncertain world. There may be no tidy solutions or pithy answers to life’s big challenges, but Michelle Obama believes that we can all locate and lean on a set of tools to help us better navigate change and remain steady within flux. In The Light We Carry, she opens a frank and honest dialogue with readers, considering the questions many of us wrestle with: How do we build enduring and honest relationships? How can we discover strength and community inside our differences? What tools do we use to address feelings of self-doubt or helplessness? What do we do when it all starts to feel like too much? Michelle Obama offers readers a series of fresh stories and insightful reflections on change, challenge, and power, including her belief that when we light up for others, we can illuminate the richness and potential of the world around us, discovering deeper truths and new pathways for progress. Drawing from her experiences as a mother, daughter, spouse, friend, and First Lady, she shares the habits and principles she has developed to successfully adapt to change and overcome various obstacles—the earned wisdom that helps her continue to “become.” She details her most valuable practices, like “starting kind,” “going high,” and assembling a “kitchen table” of trusted friends and mentors. With trademark humor, candor, and compassion, she also explores issues connected to race, gender, and visibility, encouraging readers to work through fear, find strength in community, and live with boldness. “When we are able to recognize our own light, we become empowered to use it,” writes Michelle Obama. A rewarding blend of powerful stories and profound advice that will ignite conversation, The Light We Carry inspires readers to examine their own lives, identify their sources of gladness, and connect meaningfully in a turbulent world.

Cupine" The Real Family Feud

Biographies & Memoirs

"Cupine" The Real Family Feud is a clever interpretation of the events that took place when I went on a very popular game show. Comical, exciting and thrilling this book is about a true event that occurred in my life. I was on a game show called Family Feud. I am taking you on the journey explaining how I got on the show, how I did and what happened after the show. I want to tell people a little about my family and myself. I am often asked how I came up with my genius answer. This Book should sum it all up.

A Personal Odyssey

Biographies & Memoirs

This is the gritty story of one man's lifelong education in the school of hard knocks, as his journey took him from Harlem to the Marines, the Ivy League, and a career as a controversial writer, teacher, and economist in government and private industry. It is also the story of the dramatically changing times in which this personal odyssey took place. The vignettes of the people and places that made an impression on Thomas Sowell at various stages of his life range from the poor and the powerless to the mighty and the wealthy, from a home for homeless boys to the White House, as well as ranging across the United States and around the world. It also includes Sowell's startling discovery of his own origins during his teenage years. If the child is father to the man, this memoir shows the characteristics that have become familiar in the public figure known as Thomas Sowell already present in an obscure little boy born in poverty in the Jim Crow South during the Great Depression and growing up in Harlem. His marching to his own drummer, his disregard of what others say or think, even his battles with editors who attempt to change what he has written, are all there in childhood. More than a story of the life of Sowell himself, this is also a story of the people who gave him their help, their support, and their loyalty, as well as those who demonized him and knifed him in the back. It is a story not just of one life, but of life in general, with all its exhilaration and pain.

Tiger Woods

Biographies & Memoirs

Tiger Woods cuenta la trepidante historia, llena de claroscuros, de la ascensión, caída y renacimiento del mejor golfista de todos los tiempos.En 2009, Tiger Woods era probablemente el deportista más famoso del mundo; una estrella de fama y fortuna inconmensurables que gozaba de lo que, en apariencia, era una vida idílica, casado con una bella mujer, dos hijos y el mejor swing del circuito. Con un palmarés que incluía catorce majors y setenta y nueve torneos del PGA Tour, Woods tenía unos ingresos anuales de más de cien millones de dólares y era la cara de multinacionales como Nike, Gillette, AT&T o Gatorade. Pero todo pendía de un hilo. Tras un aparatoso accidente de madrugada, cuando se estampó con su todoterreno contra un árbol y quedó inconsciente tras huir precipitadamente de su mansión, se destapó un historial de infidelidades que hicieron que la cuidada imagen del deportista perfecto se desmoronara.Los periodistas Jeff Benedict, de Sports Illustrated, y Armen Keteyian, once veces ganador de un Emmy, trazan un fascinante relato del que posiblemente sea el mayor deportista individual de la historia moderna a partir de más de cuatrocientas entrevistas con personas cercanas a Woods y más de tres años de investigación. El resultado es un monumental retrato psicológico del niño prodigio que, espoleado por unos padres que lo sometieron a una férrea disciplina castrense y que afirmaban que era "el Elegido", se convirtió muy pronto en la gran promesa del golf —con precoces apariciones en televisión con tan solo dos años—, pero, como contrapartida, desarrolló una enfermiza relación con su entorno y conductas compulsivas y adictivas que propiciarían una caída en desgracia de proporciones shakesperianas.

Beauty and the Inferno

Biographies & Memoirs

Essays on art, politics and life from the best-selling author of GomorrahGomorrah, Roberto Saviano’s 2006 exposé of Naples’s Camorra mafia, was an international bestseller and became an award-winning film. But the death threats that followed forced the author into hiding. Saviano was ostracized by his countrymen and went on the run, changing his location every few months and compelled to keep perpetual company with his bodyguards. To this day, he lives in an undisclosed location.The loneliness of the fugitive life informs the essays in Beauty and the Inferno. Among other subjects, he writes about the legendary South African jazz singer Miriam Makeba, his meeting with the real-life Donnie Brasco, sharing the Nobel Academy platform with Salman Rushdie, and the murdered Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya. Present throughout the book is a sense of Saviano’s peculiar isolation, which infuses his words with anger, exceptional insight and tragedy.

The House of Rothschild

Biographies & Memoirs

From the bestselling author of The Ascent of Money and The Square and the TowerIn his rich and nuanced portrait of the remarkable, elusive Rothschild family, Oxford scholar and bestselling author Niall Ferguson uncovers the secrets behind the family's phenomenal economic success. He reveals for the first time the details of the family's vast political network, which gave it access to and influence over many of the greatest statesmen of the age. And he tells a family saga, tracing the importance of unity and the profound role of Judaism in the lives of a dynasty that rose from the confines of the Frankfurt ghetto and later used its influence to assist oppressed Jews throughout Europe. A definitive work of impeccable scholarship with a thoroughly engaging narrative, The House of Rothschild is a biography of the rarest kind, in which mysterious and fascinating historical figures finally spring to life.

Greyboy

Biographies & Memoirs

An honest and courageous examination of what it means to navigate the in-between Cole has heard it all before—token, bougie, oreo, Blackish—the things we call the kids like him. Black kids who grow up in white spaces, living at an intersection of race and class that many doubt exists. He needed to get far away from the preppy site of his upbringing before he could make sense of it all. Through a series of personal anecdotes and interviews with his peers, Cole transports us to his adolescence and explores what it’s like to be young and in search of identity. He digs into the places where, in youth, a greyboy’s difference is most acutely felt: parenting, police brutality, Trumpism, depression, and dating, to name a few. Greyboy: Finding Blackness in a White World asks an important question: What is Blackness? It also provides the answer: Much more than you thought, dammit.

The Ultimate King Henry VIII Collection

Biographies & Memoirs

Includes: •Charles River Editors’ original biography of King Henry VIII •A biography of Henry VIII by David Hume, from The History of England •Henry VIII and the Church of England by Israel Smith Clare •Henry VIII’s Act of Supremacy "We are, by the sufferance of God, King of England; and the Kings of England in times past never had any superior but God." – King Henry VIII Over 450 years after his reign, Henry VIII is still the most famous and recognizable King of England, but it’s for all the wrong reasons. Though well regarded by contemporaries as a learned king and "one of the most charismatic rulers to sit on the English throne", he is best remembered today for his gluttony and multiple marriages, particularly the gruesome way in which he was widowed on more than one occasion. Naturally, that was the focus of the popular Show Time drama series centered around his life, The Tudors. Henry VIII will probably continue to be best known for beheading some of his wives, most notably Anne Boleyn, so it is somewhat fitting that his most decisive act came as a result of a marital mishap. Sharply at odds with the Catholic Church over his attempt to dissolve his marriage with Catherine of Aragon, Henry VIII ultimately broke with the Church and established the Church of England, which forever both the religious history of England and the social hierarchy of the nation and its empire. Though the popular perception of his reign has taken hold, King Henry VIII did not start life in any of those ways. In fact, he did not even start life as heir to the English throne. And when he did come to the throne at the age of 18, King Henry VIII’s earliest monarchical years showed his promise as a quintessential renaissance, polymath Prince. Even on the religious front, Henry VIII started out believing in the essential Catholic theology, even after the Pope and the Vatican excommunicated Henry from the Catholic Church (until then, the undisputed political as well as theological leader of Christendom, from which monarchs often needed various forms of legitimacy). For all these reasons, the manner in which his life and legacy diverge makes him an even more fascinating topic, one that clearly continues to captivate audiences around the world today. The Ultimate King Henry VIII Collection chronicles Henry VIII’s life and reign with an original biography, as well as biographies by David Hume and Israel Clare. It also includes Henry’s historic Act of Supremacy, pictures, and a table of Contents.

Palm Sunday

Biographies & Memoirs

“[Kurt Vonnegut] is either the funniest serious writer around or the most serious funny writer.”—Los Angeles Times Book ReviewIn this self-portrait by an American genius, Kurt Vonnegut writes with beguiling wit and poignant wisdom about his favorite comedians, country music, a dead friend, a dead marriage, and various cockamamie aspects of his all-too-human journey through life. This is a work that resonates with Vonnegut’s singular voice: the magic sound of a born storyteller mesmerizing us with truth. “Vonnegut is at the top of his form, and it is wonderful.”—Newsday

The Buddha's Apprentices

Biographies & Memoirs

Sumi Loundon's Blue Jean Buddha was hailed by the New York Times Review of Books as "a bellwether anthology"--mapping the spiritual trails followed by a generation of American Buddhist youths. The Buddha's Apprentices examines that territory in fuller detail, telling twenty-six more stories of this powerful spiritual path, including the stories of many teenagers. The book shows us the common challenges that spiritually hungry young adults of today might face, with a focus on the identity issues around personality, profession, and lifestyle. Also included are several affirming essays from prominent older Buddhists, recalling their first encounters with Buddhism. The Buddha's Apprentices inspires, examining the tectonic shifts that young, spiritually-inclined people undergo as they leave home, search for partners, consider commitment and marriage, and build their lives. Furthermore, they tell of how Buddhism changes and enhances their abilities to face life's difficulties. Sumi Loundon's rich and youthful commentary lets us appreciate each contributor's individual voice, and helps us to see how they contribute to the always-evolving chorus of modern Buddhism. The Buddha's Apprentices can be considered a sequel to Sumi Loundon's Blue Jean Buddha, but goes beyond that work by giving extra attention to teens and young adults and including pieces from Thich Nhat Hanh, Lama Surya Das, and a truly diverse array of younger author/contributors.

Martes con mi viejo profesor

Biographies & Memoirs

Un libro sencillo e intenso que encierra profundas verdades. Conversaciones entre Mitch y su antiguo profesor de la universidad todos los martes. Una historia real para un libro de culto. El libro que ha cambiado la vida a millones de personas.

El Diario del Che en Bolivia

Biographies & Memoirs

"He llegado a los 39 y se acerca inexorablemente una edad que da que pensar sobre mi futuro guerrillero; por ahora estoy 'entero'."—Che Guevara, 14 de junio de 1967Esta nueva edición del diario del que sería el último año del Che Guevara, detalla los esfuerzos del Che por dar inicio a una insurrección guerrillera contra el gobierno militar de Bolivia. El diario fue hallado en su mochila al ser capturado por el ejército boliviano en octubre de 1967. Esta nueva revisión incluye el texto de Fidel Castro “Una introducción necesaria”, en el que saca a la luz las mentiras incluidas en una edición anterior preparada por la CIA, con el objetivo de desacreditar al Che, la expedición boliviana y a la revolución cubana misma. El Diario de Che en Bolivia nos revela a un Che más viejo, más experimentado, con su salud mermada, distinto al juvenil y exuberante del Diario de Motocicleta escrito quince años antes, o del implacable y maduro Pasajes de la Guerra Revolucionaria: Congo, de apenas dos años antes. Aquí habla con punzante ironía al narrar los desafíos cotidianos encarados por su pequeño grupo guerrillero, los pronunciamientos del gobierno militar, así como las acciones de la enorme fuerza militar que los atacaba. La última anotación describe el día previo a la captura del Che, apenas dos días antes de su muerte.

The Possession

Biographies & Memoirs

WINNER OF THE 2022 NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURESelf-regard, in the works of Annie Ernaux, is always an excruciatingly painful and exact process. Here, she revisits the peculiar kind of self-fulfillment possible when we examine ourselves in the aftermath of a love affair, and sometimes, even, through the eyes of the lost beloved.

Louis Philippe

Biographies & Memoirs

The origin of the House of Orleans is involved in some obscurity. The city of Orleans, from which the duke takes his title, was the Aurelium of imperial Rome. The first Duke of Orleans with whom history makes us familiar was Philip, the only brother of Louis XIV. Louis XIII., the son and heir of Henry IV., married Anne of Austria. Two children were born to them, Louis and Philippe. The first became the world-renowned monarch, Louis XIV. His brother, known in history as Monsieur, enjoyed the title and the princely revenues of the dukedom of Orleans.Monsieur married, as his first wife, the beautiful Henrietta Stuart, daughter of the unfortunate Charles I. of England. Her mother was Henrietta of France, the daughter of Henry IV., and sister of Louis XIII. She died in the bloom of youth and beauty, of poison, after the most cruel sufferings, on the 27th of June, 1669. Philippe took as his second wife Elizabeth Charlotte, daughter of the Elector Charles of Bavaria. By this marriage he left a son, Philippe, who not only inherited his father's almost boundless wealth and princely titles, but who attained wide-spread notoriety, not to say renown, as the regent of France, after the death of Louis XIV., and during the minority of Louis XV. The regent was a man of indomitable force of will. During his long regency he swayed the sceptre of a tyrant; and the ear of Europe was poisoned with the story of his debaucheries.

Reagan: His Life and Legend

Biographies & Memoirs

"Reagan: His Life and Legend aims to be the definitive biography, and it succeeds. It’s a thoughtful, absorbing account. It’s also a surprising one." —Daniel Immerwahr, New Yorker Named one of the "Nonfiction Books to Read This Fall" by NPR and the New York Times Son of the Midwest, movie star, and mesmerizing politician—America’s fortieth president comes to three-dimensional life in this gripping and profoundly revisionist biography.In this “monumental and impressive” biography, Max Boot, the distinguished political columnist, illuminates the untold story of Ronald Reagan, revealing the man behind the mythology. Drawing on interviews with over one hundred of the fortieth president’s aides, friends, and family members, as well as thousands of newly available documents, Boot provides “the best biography of Ronald Reagan to date” (Robert Mann). The story begins not in star-studded Hollywood but in the cradle of the Midwest, small-town Illinois, where Reagan was born in 1911 to Nelle Clyde Wilson, a devoted Disciples of Christ believer, and Jack Reagan, a struggling, alcoholic salesman. Boot vividly creates a portrait of a handsome young man, indeed a much-vaunted lifeguard, whose early successes mirrored those of Horatio Alger. And contextualizing Reagan’s life against American history, Boot re-creates the world in which Reagan transitioned from local Iowa sportscaster to budding screen actor. The world of Hollywood from the 1930s to the 1950s would prove significant, not only in Reagan’s coming-of-age in such classics as Knute Rockne and Kings Row but during the twilight of his film career, when he played opposite a chimpanzee in Bedtime for Bonzo, and then his eventual emergence as a television host of General Electric Theater, which established his bona fides as one of the leading conservative voices of the time. Indeed, the leap to California governor in 1966 seemed almost preordained, in which Reagan became a bellwether for a nation in the throes of a generational shift. Reagan’s 1980 presidential election augured a shift that continues into this century. Boot writes not as a partisan but as a historian seeking to set the story straight. He explains how Reagan was an ideologue but also a supreme pragmatist who signed pro-abortion and gun control bills as governor, cut deals with Democrats in both Sacramento and Washington, and befriended Mikhail Gorbachev to end the Cold War. A master communicator, Reagan revived America’s spirits after the traumas of Vietnam and Watergate. But Boot also shows how Reagan was armored in obliviousness. He traces Reagan’s opposition to civil rights over forty years, reveals how he neglected the exploding AIDS epidemic, and details how America experienced a level of income inequality not seen since the Gilded Age. With its revelatory insights, Reagan: His Life and Legend is no apologia, depicting a man with a good-versus-evil worldview derived from his moralistic upbringing and Hollywood westerns. Providing fresh examinations of “trickle-down economics,” the Cold War’s end, the Iran-Contra affair, as well as a nuanced portrait of Reagan’s family, this definitive biography is as compelling a presidential biography as any in recent decades.

Rescuing Sprite

Biographies & Memoirs

From the New York Times bestselling radio personality Mark Levin and his family comes the true story of the two years of joy and anguish they had with a rescue dog named Sprite.Mark Levin, while known as a lawyer and nationally syndicated broadcaster, considers himself first and foremost a dog lover. In 2004, Mark’s family added a new member to their bunch—a beautiful, Spaniel-mixed dog they named Sprite. With his beautiful face and soft, huggable fur, Sprite immediately bonded with the Levin family.But on Halloween night, just three weeks after being adopted, Sprite collapsed and had to be rushed to the animal hospital in what would turn out to be the first of many such visits—and a difficult, heart-wrenching journey for the entire family.Over the next two years, Sprite’s health deteriorated, but his spirit remained high and his beauty and grace continued to inspire, until the holiday season of 2006, when the Levin family had to say a final goodbye to their beloved pet. Rescuing Sprite is a stunningly intimate revelation of the strong love that can develop between a family and a pet, and the realization, as Mark Levin puts it, that “in the end, we humans are the lucky ones.”

The Letters of Horace Walpole, Earl of Orford — Volume 2

Biographies & Memoirs

This is a biographical book. I have been so shut up in the House of Commons for this last fortnight or three weeks, that I have not had time to write you a line: we have not had such a session since the famous beginning of last Parliament. I am come hither for a day or two of rest and air, and find the additional pleasure of great beauty in my improvements: I could talk to you through the whole sheet, and with much more satisfaction, upon this head; but I shall postpone my own amusement to yours, for I am sure you want much more to know what has been doing in Parliament than at Strawberry Hill. You will conclude that we have been fighting over the peace; but we have not. It is laid before Parliament, but will not be taken up; the Opposition foresee that a vote of approbation would pass, and therefore will not begin upon it, as they wish to reserve it for censure in the next reign--or perhaps the next reign does not care to censure now what he must hereafter maintain--and the ministry do not seem to think their treaty so perfect as not to be liable to blame, should it come to be canvassed.

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